


To the Hellmouth and Back

by sabby1



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types
Genre: Dark Willow Rosenberg (BtVS), Dimension Travel, M/M, Magic, Prompt Fill, Spells & Enchantments, Strawberries, magical Alec
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-02-25 08:02:03
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,158
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22052563
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sabby1/pseuds/sabby1
Summary: Alec and Magnus are just trying to get away with a make-out session in Alec's office when they're interrupted by one of Magnus's old friends bringing news of the Big Bad.OR the one where Buffy comes to Magnus for help because Willow's gone dark-side. Again.
Relationships: Magnus Bane/Alec Lightwood
Comments: 14
Kudos: 90
Collections: SHBingo





	To the Hellmouth and Back

**Author's Note:**

> This is a prompt fill for [Toby the Wise's Shadowhunter Bingo](https://shadowhunterbingo.tumblr.com/)   
> The square filled was Interdimensional Travel.

**_Alicante_** , **_2020_**

The waning light of the Mediterranean sun drenches the heavy wooden furniture of the High Inquisitor’s office in a warm orange glow. Alec and Magnus are taking a rare opportunity between grueling meetings to make out like the carefree teenagers neither of them ever really got to be.

Magnus is perched on Alec’s desk, probably creasing very important Clave paperwork under his butt. He couldn’t care less. The important thing is Alec standing between his legs, rubbing against him in all the right places, kissing him like neither of them needs to breathe.

A whoosh of displaced air ruffles Magnus’s spiked hair. His fingers freeze in the middle of messing up Alec’s dark curls for a second, because he’s pretty sure the windows were closed.

Then Alec does that thing with his tongue and pulls Magnus closer with a large, warm hand on the small of his back, grinding them together. What are windows again?

Someone clears their throat.

Magnus ignores it.

The person clears their throat again. Louder.

Alec pulls out of their kiss with a wet smack and a low growl that makes Magnus’s slacks feel too tight in the crotch.

“This better be important,” he barks in his ‘High Inquisitor’ tone with a nasty glare over his shoulder.

“I’m sorry, tall, dark, and thirsty. I hate to interrupt, but I need to borrow your honey for a minute. Apocalypse stuff.”

Magnus recognizes the valley-girl drawl even before he leans around Alec’s tense broad shoulders to take a look at the intruder.

Her honey blonde hair is pulled up in a no-nonsense ponytail. There are subtle crow’s feet around her sparkling green eyes, and the lines around her mouth speak of decades of fierce scowls. She’s still rocking the tight pants and long red leather coat.

“Buffy Summers!” Magnus gapes. “My god, it’s been years. You must be, what--”

“Don’t!” One of her tiny, deadly hands flies up in the air, a sharp, pointy index finger with dark red nail polish aimed at his face. “Even. Remember the rules. Cheaters don’t get to talk age around us mere mortals.”

Alec stiffens beside him and Magnus tries to suppress his instinctive wince in reaction. Immortality is still a sensitive topic between them.

Alec crosses his arms and rounds on him. His long dark brows raise in expectation over an arctic glare, and his kiss-swollen lips straighten into a firm line.

“Do you want to introduce me?”

Magnus tries to ward off the impending spat with his most disarming smile.

“Of course,” he purrs. “Alexander, meet Buffy Summers, the vampire slayer.” He turns back to Buffy. He can’t wait to see her reaction. “Buffy, this is Alexander Lightwood-Bane. My husband.”

Her rose-pink mouth drops open and the years fall off her face. She’s eighteen again and learning that there is an alternate dimension where real angels exist and snooty people in black leather have to scribble magical tattoos all over themselves to be able to fight demons.

“No way.”

“Way.”

He holds up his left hand to display the wedding band on his ring finger.

“No way!” She grins.

“Way.” He snickers.

“No way!”

“Oh, for the love of Raziel!” Alec throws his hands up. “Will one of you please explain to me what’s happening?” He turns his glare on Buffy. “How did you even get in here?”

Buffy’s face turns serious on a dime. She crosses her arms.

“Portal shard,” she says with a frown Magnus hasn’t seen since the whole First Evil debacle back in ’03. “The one you and Willow made before you left.” 

Magnus remembers. It’s the most powerful thing he’s ever created. A break glass in case of emergency single use item. It had only been possible by combining his magic with that of Willow Rosenberg, undoubtedly the most powerful witch in Buffy’s dimension.

The fact that Buffy used it doesn’t bode well. Whatever is happening in her dimension, it’s worse than a town official going full demon, worse than a hell goddess bringing about the end of the world, and worse than the First Evil rising from a wide-open hellmouth.

Alec frowns. “Portal shard? Like the one Clary’s mother gave her? From another dimension?”

Magnus makes a so-so hand motion. “It’s a bit more advanced than that. The shard didn’t just cross dimensions. It was anchored to me personally and would take anyone who used it to wherever I am at the time.”

Alec’s eyes widen. Magnus knows exactly what’s going through his husband’s mind because he’s thinking the same thing. If Buffy had used the shard a year ago…

Alec snorts and shakes his head at the slayer.

“You have no idea how lucky you are that you didn’t go straight to Edom.”

“Whatever.” Buffy rolls her eyes. “I’m not here to catch up. I need your help.”

Magnus takes a deep breath and braces himself.

“What happened?”

"It's Willow. She fell off the wagon again."

Willow Rosenberg off the deep end. Magnus vividly remembers the horror story. He’d heard it from the horse’s mouth when he met her in Devon. Black veins on liquid white skin. Demonic black eyes and enough power to tear the whole planet apart. Literally.

“How did it happen?”

Buffy swallows. A sad look passes her eyes.

“Oz was killed by a rogue hunter.”

Magnus blinks, unable to stop himself from doing a double take.

“Oz? ‘Dingoes Ate My Baby’ Oz?”

Daniel ‘Oz’ Osbourne was Willow’s first boyfriend way back in high school. By the time Magnus visited Buffy’s dimension again, the boy had been out of the picture and Willow was dating a girl named Tara.

“Dingoes ate what?” Alec says thinly.

“Band name.” Buffy and Magnus say at the same time.

The slayer’s face is grim. “Oz was a werewolf. He was also Willow’s first love. First real love. Xander doesn’t count.” Her eyes go wide. “Don’t tell him I said that.” 

Magnus accepts the explanation with a shrug. He still doesn’t quite understand.

Then again, last time it was the loss of her girlfriend Tara that had thrown Willow into a tailspin of magical mayhem and murder.

Alec goes rigid beside him. He radiates tension and sympathy. Magnus puts a mental pin in having a serious discussion with his husband about the dangers of going dark-side because of love.

“She’s been taking down hunters, Warren-style,” Buffy says, “looking for the one that did it.”

Magnus flinches. It’s bad, but as far as Dark-Willow goes, it’s not as bad as it could be. If she’s still at the stage of skinning individual people alive, maybe they have time to save Buffy’s planet.

The only thing that had been able to avert the apocalypse back then was the love of Willow’s best friend, Alexander Harris, and the boy’s unhealthy ability to take serious physical abuse with a smile.

“Did Xander try the crayon speech?”

The slayer’s face screws up in a grimace. “He did. He’s still in the hospital. Almost lost the other eye.”

“Damn.”

Buffy holds on tighter to her crossed arms. “Magnus, I need you. Giles tried to get the Devon coven involved, but they’re too scared of her.”

At the mention of Rupert Giles, Magnus is hit with a rush of fond nostalgia.

“Rupert? How is my crusty old crumpet?”

He snaps his mouth shut a second too late. He probably shouldn’t have brought that up in front of his husband.

“Crumpet?”

Alec’s tone is the dangerous kind of mild that precedes his most spectacular eruptions.

Buffy’s face goes through a series of uncomfortable expressions.

“Giles died.” She glares at Alec. “Angel killed him.”

Magnus closes his eyes and lets the pain roll through him. He liked Rupert Giles. The taciturn British watcher had reminded him of Ragnor in so many ways. He also more than lived up to his nickname between the sheets. ‘The Ripper’ had caused the welcome demise of several of Magnus’s shirts in their brief time together.

“Then he and Faith brought him back as a twelve-year old. He’s in college now.”

Magnus does another double take and watches Alec do the same next to him.

“Look,” Buffy says calmly, waving off the impossible like it’s par for the course. “I get that it’s a lot. Trust me, I’m not thrilled to be interrupting the happy smoochies with news of the Big Bad. But I really need to borrow your hubby to stop my best friend from bringing the apocalypse, again, so can we, please, skip the jealous lover part and go straight to the inter-dimensional rescue mission?”

Alec’s arms are still firmly crossed in front of his chest and he’s glaring at Buffy like she’s the most annoying thing he’s had to deal with since Clary Fairchild. She probably is.

Magnus steps between them before the glaring match can turn into an actual physical fight. He’s not sure either of the two would walk away from that without permanent damage.

“Alexander,” he purrs, running his palms over Alec’s tightly knotted biceps to get him to uncross his arms. “Darling, I know this isn’t exactly the evening we had planned, and you certainly deserve an explanation, but I do have to go with her. I promise, I’ll tell you everything when I get back.”

Alec scoffs. “Yeah, that’s not happening.”

Magnus blinks. It’s been a while since Alec has used that tone with him. It’s been a while since Magnus has felt a sudden urge to ask the brat just whom he thinks he’s talking to.

“Excuse you?”

“I’m not letting you go alone.”

Magnus feels his indignation go up in a puff of rose-colored smoke. His husband is so sweet when he’s being supportive.

“Alexander,” he says, trying to decide how to best convince Alec to stay out of danger and wait for him at home.

“Don’t even try.” Alec’s tone is irrefutable. “I’m coming with you.” He looks around Magnus’s shoulder at Buffy. “Assuming you have a way to get all of us back to your dimension?”

Buffy’s face crumples up with embarrassment before she snaps herself out of it with a beleaguered pout.

“Hey, figuring out the logistics is part of your job. You’re the rescue team. I’m just the damsel in distress.”

Magnus rolls his eyes. “You wouldn’t know how to be a distressed damsel if someone wrote you a cheat sheet.”

Buffy snickers. “Remind me to tell you about Halloween ’97 when this is over.”

“I can’t wait to hear it.”

“So,” she says chewing on her bottom lip. “Logistics?”

Magnus takes them through a portal to the Shakespeare Garden in New York’s Central Park and from there into the Wandering Woods of the Seelie Realm. It’s lucky he still has plenty of favors to call in among the fair folk.

The portal to Buffy’s dimension is a violent black and green vortex between two towering California redwoods.

The Seelie warrior who brought them blocks their passage with a nasty looking spear.

“Since you don’t exist in her dimension, you will not have to worry about losing yourself in your alternate versions, but I won’t keep the portal open indefinitely.”

The warrior materializes a rose from the winding trellis growing along his arm and hands it to Magnus.

“If you do not return before the last petal has fallen, you will be trapped in her dimension forever.”

Magnus doesn’t bother to mention that he’s been able to create his own way back to his home dimension just fine the last few times he went. Of course, he had needed Willow’s help each time.

“Right,” he says, sliding the rose into one of the open button holes on his silk shirt. “Thanks.”

Buffy scowls at the Seelie like she’s trying to decide if she should slay him on principle.

“You done bootlegging Beauty and the Beast?” She smiles and tips the spear out of her way. “Great. Come on, guys.”

She steps through the portal without waiting for an answer.

“Sorry,” Magnus says with a shrug, following her. “The impending apocalypse always makes her a little cranky.”

A firm hand closes tightly around his elbow before he can step into the shimmering vortex.

Magnus looks up along the black-clad arm into the scowling face of his husband. He smiles his most charming smile.

“I wasn’t going to leave you.”

Alec’s scowl doesn’t soften. “I’m not taking any chances on getting separated.”

Magnus rolls his eyes. He manages to pry Alec’s hand off his elbow and laces their fingers instead.

“Come on,” he says with a grin and a gentle squeeze. “Let’s go save the world.”

“It’s not even ours,” Alec grumbles as they step through the portal together.

**_Sunnydale_** , **_2020_**

Magnus steps out of the portal, hand in hand with Alec, onto the main street of a thriving Southern California beach town that used to be a vast deserted pit of dirt and debris.

“This is unreal.”

They walk past a hip little cocktail bar, a fancy boutique, an antique store, and a comic book shop.

Buffy shrugs. “The hellmouth’s been gone for almost twenty years, and it’s still prime California real estate. I mean, the beach is like a fifteen-minute walk that way.” She points to her left. “But I get what you mean.”

Alec frowns. “I don’t.”

Magnus squeezes their interlaced fingers. “This place used to be right on top of a hellmouth, a convergence center for mystical and demonic energy. A little like the rift to Edom. When Buffy blew it up back in ’03, it took the whole town with it. Left nothing but a gigantic crater.”

Alec gives him the same look he always does when Magnus brings up a story from his past that is so surreal Alec’s not sure if Magnus is making it up or telling the truth.

“Killed my honey, too,” Buffy quips helpfully. “We’re talking tragedy on an epic scale.”

“I’m so sorry,” Magnus says, trying to remember whom if anyone Buffy was dating back then.

“Oh, he got better.”

She stops them in front of a new age magic shop with a neon fortune teller sign in the window.

“This is us.”

The sign on the door says it’s closed. Buffy knocks on the glass with the persistence of a cranky woodpecker.

“Yeah, yeah. Hang on to your knickers.”

Magnus would recognize that cantankerous British burr anywhere.

“Crumpet!”

“Blimey, Magnus?”

He’s ripped away from Alec into the crushing hug of a tall, lean, _college-aged_ Ripper who still knows exactly where to put his hands to make Magnus blush like a Catholic school girl.

“Married!” Magnus squeaks with the last bit of air left in his lungs from the tight embrace.

“I believe my husband is trying to tell you to let him go.”

He can feel Alec’s murderous glare like a knife stabbing into Rupert’s hand on his right butt cheek.

“Sorry,” Rupert steps back immediately. “Married?”

His gaze searches Magnus’s face and there is a noticeable shimmer of disappointment in the grey-green eyes behind the gold-rimmed glasses. His dark blond mop of curls lacks any signs of gray, and he’s traded in his standard corduroy for a modern sport jacket over a white T-shirt.

Magnus smiles, instinctively stepping back to reach for Alec. Luckily, his husband doesn’t protest or pull away when Magnus puts his arm around him. Quite the opposite, Alec wraps one arm around his waist and pulls him so close Magnus stumbles on his feet.

“Happiest I’ve ever been,” he says honestly, looking up at the surly love of his life. “Alexander, meet Rupert Giles, erstwhile watcher of Buffy Summers. Rupert, this is my husband, Alexander Lightwood-Bane.”

“Hyphenated?” Rupert grimaces and shakes his head. “Still a soggy biscuit.”

“Shut up, you crusty old crumpet.”

“Hello!” Buffy interrupts their exchange. “Crazy Dark-Willow on the loose. Can we save the reunions for later?”

“Right, of course, of course.” Rupert waves them inside. “Come on in.”

They all bustle into the magic shop. Magnus notices that Alec has yet to let him out of his grip. He doesn’t mind all that much.

The shop looks a lot like its predecessor from the early 2000s. Tall wooden shelves are spread along the walls. They are crammed to the brim with mythical reference books, spell ingredients, and real magical items tucked innocently between tons of meaningless new age nonsense. If Magnus knows anything, the counter with the old-fashioned cash register keeps all the really dangerous stuff safe behind lock and key.

“Talk about a blast from the past,” he mutters.

Rupert motions to a round wooden table surrounded by six sturdy chairs.

“Please, have a seat.”

Magnus sits down first. He is not surprised when Alec takes the seat right next to him and places a possessive arm on the back of his chair. Magnus rolls his eyes but leans into it anyway.

“So, Veiny-Willow?” he prompts.

Buffy steps up to the table with her arms crossed and her serious-slayer-business expression firmly in place.

“She started her spree two days ago in Tibet where Oz was killed. By the time his wife got news to us, Willow had already jumped the Pacific. We tried to head her off in San Francisco, but Xander couldn’t get through to her. We’re pretty sure she’s in L.A. right now.”

“And she’s been going after rogue hunters?”

“Hunters and magic powers. According to Xander, she’s gearing up for the big one. She wants to take out every hunter around the globe simultaneously so the one who killed Oz has no chance to get away.”

Magnus winces. A spell of that magnitude with genocidal purpose is almost definitely going to open a new hellmouth and unleash its horrors on an unsuspecting humanity.

Alec looks around them and furrows his brows.

“What do you mean she’s going after magic powers?”

Buffy purses her lips and rocks on her feet.

“There’s been a bit of a shortage the past few years, so she won’t be able to get a fill-up just anywhere. That’s kind of what we’re hoping will work in our favor.”

Alec’s eyes narrow with immediate suspicion.

“That didn’t really answer my question.”

Magnus remembers how it works. It makes their current meeting place a bit of an unsafe hang-out spot. A quick glance at Rupert confirms it.

The young watcher is leaning against the counter, polishing his glasses with the hem of his T-shirt so he doesn’t have to look anyone in the face while they hear the bad news.

Buffy inspects her heavy boots with an uncomfortable expression.

“Magic books, at first,” she says. “Once she gets enough juice, she can suck the magic right out of people.”

Alec’s response is fast and furious. “And your bright idea was to find the most powerful warlock in my dimension and bring him here?” He’s up on his feet and grabbing Magnus’s arm, pulling him out of his chair. “We’re leaving.”

“Alec—“

“No.” The word sounds like a fist banged on the table. “I won’t let them use you as bait.”

“We won’t!” Buffy yells at the top of her lungs. “The shop is bait. Magnus is the trap!”

Alec whirls around on the slayer, putting himself between her and Magnus.

“How is he going to trap her if she can suck the magic right out of him?”

Buffy steps right up into Alec’s face, ignoring the fact that he is a foot taller than her.

“I’m counting on the fact that he’s strong enough not to let her suck him.”

“And you’re basing this fact on what?”

“Oh, I don’t know, maybe because he’s the most powerful warlock in your dimension?”

“Don’t try to twist my words around on me. Your plan is crap! It could get everyone killed. It’s definitely going to get Magnus killed.”

Alec turns away from her with a frustrated growl, massaging his temples between his thumb and middle finger. It’s the thing he does whenever someone or something gives him a sudden stress headache.

“What is it with tiny women and insane plans?” he grumbles under his breath.

Buffy huffs. “What is it with tall guys named Alexander always whining about the plan? If you don’t like it, come up with a better one!”

Alec’s shoulders tense up. He drops his hand and raises his head. His glare ends up aiming straight at Magnus.

Magnus bites down on the inside of his lips to keep himself from blurting out that Buffy has a point.

Alec’s face turns hard as stone. Magnus can read the lack of expression like the blurb on the back of a book. He’s the High Inquisitor of the Clave. He has been through hell and back. He can most certainly come up with a better plan and execute it, too.

“How much time do I have?” Alec’s tone is calm and confident.

“However long it takes Willow to sniff out the magic in this place.”

Alec folds his hands behind his back and turns around to face Buffy with a neutral expression.

“I need all the pertinent information about Willow and the way magic works in this dimension.”

Buffy’s eyes go comically wide. “Um, I can tell you all about Willow, but for the magic stuff, you’re gonna wanna ask him.” She points her finger toward her former watcher, who is still leaning against the counter.

“Of course.” Alec’s jaw ticks.

Magnus has no idea how, but somehow his husband manages to force a professional smile at the handsome British guy who groped Magnus less than five minutes ago.

Then Alec looks back at Buffy.

“You first,” he says. “Talk fast.”

Buffy takes a deep breath.

Thirty minutes later, they’re deep into research mode trying to find ways to siphon magic out of a person into the ground to disperse it harmlessly throughout the ley lines.

“How about this?” Buffy holds up a book to her watcher. “Ritual of Minnesota.”

“Minnetosha,” Rupert corrects absently, chewing adorably on the temple tips of his glasses. “Could work in principle, but we’d need the blood of a Persian virgin.”

Buffy shrugs. “Do you think the spell would know the difference if we used a Persian cat?”

Alec glares across the table at her. “We are not messing around with this. Next.”

Magnus rolls his eyes and goes over the passage he’s been reading again.

“Can we get our hands on a vengeance demon’s center of power?”

Buffy and Rupert exchange a look before they answer at the same time.

“No.”

“Sucks.” Magnus deflates.

“Found it.” Alec says triumphantly.

He drops the book he’s been pouring over in front of Buffy and Rupert so it is facing them and points at the passage he’s referencing.

“The Binding of Bathuriel.” Rupert puts his glasses back on and reads over the text with a growing smile on his face. “No need for virgin blood, but it requires a divine focus to channel the power and hold it until...”

He grabs the book before Buffy can finish reading and is off into the shelves.

“Will it work?” Alec asks persistently.

Buffy snickers. “You’re not going to get an answer until he’s done mumbling, but the fact that he’s mumbling while gathering stuff means it’s definitely worth a shot.”

“Buffy!” Rupert barks from inside the stacks, sounding more like a forty-year-old librarian than a twenty-year-old college kid. “Get behind the counter and pull out that old cross.”

Buffy vaults herself over the top of the counter in one fluid move and disappears behind it.

“Which one?”

“The one from the crusades!”

“Shiny and bedazzled?”

“That’s the one.”

The slayer reappears and sets a large cross on the counter with a heavy thud. The artifact is cast in pure gold and encrusted with emeralds and rubies across all four arms.

“Looks divine enough to me.”

They have barely finished preparing the spell and taken their positions when the door to the magic shop flies open.

Their plan requires Alec and Magnus to be at opposite ends of the shop. Magnus hopes Alec can keep it together long enough to stay out of harm’s way. The last thing he wants is to see Dark-Willow take a shot at his husband because Alec can’t hold himself back from trying to protect Magnus.

She’s formidable. Her hair is pitch black, falling in wispy tendrils along her darling face. Her irises are blacker than her hair, almost completely swallowing the white of her eyes. Dark veins crawl across her forehead and cheeks. She’s dressed from head to toe in black clothes.

“I spy with my little eye,” she drawls sweetly, “something that begins with an M.”

Busted. Magnus steps out from his hiding spot behind the shelves into the middle of the shop floor.

“Hey, Willow,” he says calmly. “Yeah, it’s me. Been a while.”

He smiles and hopes it doesn’t look fake.

“Oh, Magnus,” she says, doing a little double take of surprise. “I was talking about magic books, actually, but this is better.” A sunny smile lights up her terrifying face. “Much better.”

She thrusts her hands forward, fingers curled into claws and sends out a blast of magic that races toward him in bolts of lightning around dense black smoke.

Magnus barely manages to bring up his arms and form a shield before the blast hits him. He can feel the raw power clash against his protective magic.

“Willow, what are you doing? I’m your friend.”

The blast lets up. She tips her head to the side to regard him with pitch black eyes devoid of emotion.

“Then you’re not here to stop me?” she asks sweetly.

Magnus is smart enough not to lower his shield.

“This isn’t you, Willow.”

“It’s not?” she asks. “Then who is it?”

Magnus ignores her quip. He still hasn’t given up hope that he can get through to the kind, world-wise woman he met at the monastery in Devon all those years ago.

“I know you’re hurting, but this isn’t the way to deal with it. We can’t allow grief to make our choices for us, remember?”

“Aww,” she says with a little pout. “Are you trying to one-up Xander’s crayon speech?” She clicks her tongue. “Sorry. It’s not gonna work.”

Another blast of lightning and smoke barrels into his shield.

“I’m still your friend!”

“Yeah?” she shouts over the roaring squall of their clashing powers. “Friends share!”

She reinforces the stream of raw violent magic with another jerk of her hands.

Magnus sends a quick prayer to whatever higher power will listen and drops his shield.

The blast hits him like the grill of a semi-truck going ninety. He flies backward into the closest shelf. Almost passes out from the pain.

Willow is right in front of him with her hand on in chest, fingers digging through his shirt into his skin. He can feel her claw at his magic. Magnus sucks in a sharp breath.

“Now!”

The sound is like the ominous drone of an amplifier turned up to eleven. A blinding white beam of raw magical energy blasts out of Magnus through Willow’s chest and out of her back.

Rupert rattles off the final words of the incantation from the book in his hand. Buffy has braced herself on sure feet, brandishing the cross in front of her. Alec, the idiot, is vaulting out from his hiding place behind the counter to get to Magnus.

Magnus is frozen in a rictus of pain and magic, unable to close his eyes or move. He watches helplessly as the beam races across the room and misses the cross in Buffy’s hand completely.

The blinding white beam hits Alec square in the chest.

The power latches on, tethering Willow to Alec. It raises both of them high into the air.

Hurricane winds howl through the shop, sweeping things off their shelves. Magical books and mundane items fly around them in chaotic currents.

Alec is suspended motionless with his arms flung out as the raw magic power continues to barrel into him. His hair and brows have turned snow white. His eyes and mouth are ripped open. They glow with unnatural blinding light. So does every single rune on his body.

A few feet in front of Alec, Willow is trapped in the same rigid posture. The unnatural black is draining from her auburn hair, bleeding out of her wide-open eyes, and sliding back from the veins on her face. She is screaming in agony.

A deafening crack of thunder ends the spell as the last of the power leaves Willow and buries itself inside Alec.

Everything stops suspended in time and place. Then it all crashes to the ground at the same time. 

Magnus bursts into motion. He crosses the distance to Alec on his hands and knees, mindless of the debris, and bends over the prone body of his husband.

Alec’s eyes are closed. Glowing white veins crawl along the lines of his beautiful face.

Magnus refuses to believe the worst. He places his hand on Alec’s cheek. The skin under his fingers is burning hot.

“Alexander,” he says gently, like he’s just pulling him out of a nap. “Time to wake up, darling.”

Alec doesn’t react. His chest is burning hot but completely motionless under Magnus’s other hand.

“Alexander,” Magnus says louder, more firmly. “Wake up.”

He feels someone’s hand on his shoulder and throws it off.

“Wake up,” he orders again, shaking Alec’s chest.

“Magnus, I’m so sorry.” Rupert’s voice is a blurry mumble behind him.

“Don’t.” Magnus barely recognizes his own voice. His fingers are shaking with fury and magic. “Wake the fuck up!”

He slaps Alec hard across the face.

Alec’s eyes snap open. He jolts up with a gasp for breath that Magnus echoes with his own before he grabs his husband and holds onto him like he’s drowning.

“You stupid, stupid love of my life.”

Alec’s arms come around him. He’s still hotter than a furnace, but Magnus couldn’t care less if he gets third-degree burns. He grabs Alec’s face and kisses him like they just averted the apocalypse twice in under a minute.

They’re gathered around the table on the four surviving chairs, surrounded by clutter and debris.

Magnus is perched sideways on Alec’s lap with one arm around his shoulders and not feeling an ounce of shame about it.

Willow is hunched over across from them, letting Buffy hold her hand. She looks mortified and full of remorse.

Rupert has turned his chair around and straddles it with one arm resting heavily across the cracked back. His glasses dangle from the pinky finger of his other hand while he pinches the bridge of his nose.

“I’ve no idea what went wrong,” he admits gruffly.

Magnus scowls. He can guess what happened, but he needs to confirm it.

A harsh snap of his fingers drags the cross from the middle of the table right in front of him. He trails his hand over the gold and jewel encrusted artifact, letting the blue tendrils of his magic identify it for him.

The gold and gem stones are genuine, but the cross is not even a hundred years old and was created as an expensive theater prop in the 1940s.

“It’s a fake.”

Magnus barely resists the urge to pulverize the useless trinket with a flick of his hand and a blast of violent orange magic.

“But why did the spell hit him?” Buffy frowns, using her free hand to point at Alec.

Magnus snorts. “Because my husband is the genuine article.”

He turns his head to scowl down at his beautiful, stupid Nephilim.

“Don’t look at me like that,” Alec says defensively. “I had no idea the cross was fake.”

“You still threw yourself into the line of fire when you were supposed to stay down.”

A litany of wordy questions is written all over Rupert’s face.

Buffy expresses it more succinctly.

“Huh?”

Alec looks around Magnus with an uncomfortable chuckle.

“I’m a Shadowhunter. We were created with the blood of the Angel Raziel.”

“Oh, right!” Buffy snickers. “The snooty people with magical tattoos.”

Alec raises his brows at Magnus.

Magnus lowers his lashes with a coy smile. He didn’t really care to be flattering or accurate in his description of Shadowhunters back in the day.

Buffy shrugs. “Guess that made you the most divine thing in the room.”

Magnus can’t help it. “As far as I’m concerned, he’s easily the most divine thing in any room.”

The cheesy line earns him a slap to his hip and an embarrassed “Shut up,” rumbled against his shoulder followed by a nip of sharp teeth.

Willow clears her throat.

“How,” she says in a feeble voice, barely looking in their direction, “how do you feel?”

Magnus’s dopey smile evaporates. He snaps his head around to glare at the reckless, foolish witch who almost killed his husband.

“Seriously?”

He can’t believe she has the audacity to ask that question right now. She’s lucky he hasn’t turned her into a small furry animal. He still has half a mind to blast her into the shape of a gerbil and leave her like that for at least a century.

Willow’s green eyes are big and wet when she makes herself look up at them. Tears start to roll down her pale cheeks.

“My magic is gone,” she whimpers. “All of it. Into him.”

Magnus freezes. He remembers the glowing white veins crawling all over Alec’s face.

He quickly straddles Alec properly, cradles his gorgeous high cheekbones in both hands, and looks for any signs of residual magic. The veins are gone but the skin under his fingers is still warmer than it ever was before.

“Alexander? How do you feel?”

Magnus shifts closer and reaches out with his magic, trying to coax a response if anything lingers inside Alec.

“Um.”

Alec chuckles nervously. His large hands clench around Magnus’s hips, holding him still. 

There is a noticeable twitch and then a very familiar sensation starts to press up firmly against Magnus between his spread legs. He chuckles.

“Other than that,” he says with a meaningful shimmy.

“I don’t know.” Alec pulls Magnus’s hands away from his face and laces their fingers between them. “Strangely good?”

Magnus furrows his brows. “Just good or magical?”

“I don’t know,” Alec says again, shrugging. “It doesn’t feel like magic.”

“What does it feel like?”

Alec frowns and rubs his lips together like he’s trying to identify a taste in his mouth.

“It tastes like strawberry?”

Magnus doesn’t have the first clue what he’s supposed to make of that. Behind his back, he can hear Willow sniffle and shift around on her chair.

“That’s me,” she says quietly.

Alec makes a face and starts shaking his head.

“Put your hand on the table,” Willow says.

Alec gives her a skeptical look.

Magnus can’t blame him, but he’s willing to see where this goes. Willow has lost all her magic. He watched it barrel right into Alec. It’s time to find out if it’s still there or went out into the ley lines where it was supposed to go.

“Let’s try, okay?”

He presses a quick kiss to Alec’s twisted mouth and turns around on his lap. Magnus moves their linked hands to the table and presses Alec’s palm flat against the wood before he lets go and pulls back.

He feels Alec’s chin hook over his shoulder. He knows without looking that his husband is rolling his eyes.

“Now what?” Alec says in his brattiest tone.

Willow wipes her sleeve under her nose. 

“Close your eyes and think about what it used to be. What’s still inside it. Let the magic connect you.”

Alec makes a grumbling noise. His other arm tightens around Magnus and pulls him closer.

“This is stupid.”

Magnus doesn’t say anything. He just waits for Alec to get over his stubborn reluctance and try.

He feels it the instant it starts to happen.

For a second, he’s worried maybe it’s his own magic channeling through Alec, but then he realizes how different it feels. There’s no demonic origin to the power that circulates through Alec and buzzes along Magnus’s skin.

It’s pure unadulterated magic coming from the core of nature itself. And it tastes like ripe succulent strawberries.

All over the surface of the table, tiny green seedlings start to sprout.

“Magnus?”

“Not me,” he says, knowing exactly what Alec is asking.

The seedlings keep growing. Tiny verdant leaves unfurl, reaching in the direction of Alec’s magic in lieu of sunlight.

Alec pulls his hand off the table and wraps both arms around Magnus with a shaky laugh. 

“That’s crazy.”

Willow smiles wistfully. “Too much will definitely make you go wacky.”

“It won’t,” Magnus says with conviction. “Not him.”

Alec buries his nose in his shoulder.

“I should give it back anyway,” he says. “It’s not really mine.”

Magnus bites his lip. He puts his hands over Alec’s arms around him and holds on. He can feel his husband frown through two layers of fabric.

Alec raises his head. “You don’t want me to.”

Magnus shrugs and looks at their interlinked arms. He can still feel the current of Alec’s magic buzz along his skin. It feels right. He’s always liked strawberries.

“Finders, keepers?” he quips softly.

“Um, guys?” Buffy speaks up from across the table. “You might not have much of a choice here.”

Magnus looks up to find Buffy staring at them with an uncomfortable grimace.

“What?” he asks with narrowed eyes.

“Your Beauty and the Beast timer?” she says, pointing at his chest. “Just ran out.”

Magnus looks down at his shirt. The rose he had stuck in the button hole is nothing but a wilted green stem ending in a sad nub without a single petal.

Magnus and Alec are standing side by side over a golden cauldron filled with a plethora of rank smelling magical ingredients. 

Alec looks up from the nasty concoction with a revolted grimace.

“Please tell me we won’t have to drink this.”

“Goodness, no.” Magnus makes a face. “This is strictly spell and spill.”

“Thank the Angel,” Alec says with a sigh of relief.

“Pretty sure angels had nothing to do with this one,” Buffy quips as she comes over with a large freezer bag of raw chicken feet.

“Giles is driving Willow to a motel. He says if he’s not back before you leave to tell you you’re still a hopeless soggy biscuit.” She hands the bag to Magnus with a smile.

Magnus accepts it with an eye roll. “Just because I don’t feel the need to act like a tough old crumpet all the time doesn’t mean I’m a soggy biscuit. I just happen to be in touch with my emotions and prefer to express them openly in a healthy manner.”

He dumps the chicken feet into the vile mixture. It erupts with a threatening hiss and a billowing puff of purple smoke.

“I think that’s it,” he declares.

“Now what?” asks Alec.

“Now comes the tough part.” Magnus sighs. “Chant and channel to create the portal home.”

Alec doesn’t look confident. It’s been a long time since Magnus has seen the High Inquisitor of the Clave doubt himself so openly.

He reaches for his husband’s hand, laces their fingers, and holds on tight.

“You can do this. Just follow my lead and don’t mess up the words.”

“Right,” Alec grumbles. “Because I do magic and speak ancient Latin all the time.”

“That’s why you have a precision rune.”

“Oh.”

Alec closes his eyes like he’s insulting himself in his head and reaches for the stele in his back pocket. Before his hand even touches it, his precision rune lights up on its own. Bright light flashes through Alec’s eyes. His face transforms with an expression of confidence and determination.

“Okay.” His tone is surprised but convinced. “Um. I’ve got this.”

Magnus rolls his eyes with a smirk and the taste of ripe strawberry on his tongue.

Buffy looks between them with a quizzical frown. Then she shrugs it off and cocks her head with a teasing smile.

“Are you sure you don’t want to hang around for a while? I never got to tell you about Halloween ’97.”

Magnus returns the gesture with an affectionate smile of his own.

“Maybe next time,” he says. “Right now, I really just want to go home.”

The truth is, he doesn’t know if or how long Alec’s magic will last. He’s not going to risk getting both of them stuck in Sunnydale when there is still so much to do back in their own world.

“I get it.” Buffy says with a shrug and a casual nod. She steps further away from the cauldron and raises her tiny, deadly hand in a dainty little wave. “Safe travels.”

Magnus nods and tightens his hold on Alec’s hand. “Ready?”

Alec nods. 

They start to chant in unison.

“Custodes temporis spatioque. Audite nos. Aperite portam. Permitat nobis transitur in regnum nostrae.”

The taste of strawberry is overwhelming. His own magic swirls through the air like bright blue fire.

A portal opens up in front of them, creating a shimmering vortex of purple and gold. They pull each other through before it has a chance to collapse.

**_Alicante_** , **_2020_**

Magnus and Alec stumble out of the other side of the portal just before it closes and crash land in the rumpled sheets on top of a California king mattress. Magnus vaguely remembers they forgot to make the bed this morning. The sheets still smell like them and last night’s fun activities.

“Hah!” He rolls over onto his back and sprawls out as far as his arms and legs can reach. “Home Sweet Home.”

He turns his head to see Alec lying beside him, propped up on one elbow with his head resting on his hand.

“That was one hell of a trip,” he comments lightly. “My mouth still tastes like strawberry.”

“Does it?”

Magnus pulls him down into a kiss. Alec uses the opportunity to roll on top of him and push him into the mattress. He’s almost forgotten the pretext of the kiss by the time Alec pulls back to look down at him. Something about fruit.

“Do you think it’s going to fade?”

Right. Magic. Alec has magic.

“I don’t know,” Magnus says honestly.

There is a tiny seedling of a crazy, selfish hope in his mind. Spawned by the thought of what it might mean for Alec, for both of them, if this magic is permanent and plays by the rules of their dimension.

Magnus averts his eyes, afraid that everything he thinks is legible on his face in big bright block letters.

Alec’s hand on his cheek is warmer than it has ever felt. It almost burns.

“For what it’s worth,” he whispers. “I hope it doesn’t.”

Their next kiss tastes like ripe succulent strawberries and bright blue fire.

Fin


End file.
